


your turn at dice

by carolinecrane



Category: Glee
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-04-07
Updated: 2011-04-07
Packaged: 2017-10-17 17:54:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,844
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/179611
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/carolinecrane/pseuds/carolinecrane
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Puck's been a fixture in his life for long enough that Kurt just stopped noticing.  That is, until he started noticing again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	your turn at dice

At first Kurt doesn’t notice.

He has enough to think about without wasting energy wondering what Puckerman’s doing, after all. There’s his confusing relationship with Blaine, for one thing, and as if that weren’t enough adolescent angst for one person to deal with, he’s still trying to figure out how to leave Dalton behind and fit in at McKinley again. Not that he ever fit in at McKinley to begin with.

So he has a lot on his mind, and Puck hanging around his house, haunting Finn’s room and sometimes the kitchen like he’s decided to move in permanently doesn’t really register until the day Kurt walks into the bathroom and finds Puck standing in front of the mirror with an electric razor in his hand. His head’s tilted to one side, one hand following the razor’s progress across his scalp as though Puck’s testing to make sure the shave is close enough.

Kurt stops short in the doorway, the sight of Puck grooming himself in the bathroom Kurt shares with Finn making his breath catch in his throat. And he’s not even sure why, because it’s just Puck, and Kurt’s been doing his best to ignore him for years now. But this is the first time he’s found Puck standing in front of the same sink where Kurt brushes his teeth, shirtless and running sharp metal so close to his skin Kurt has to suppress a shiver.

He’s seen his father shave before, of course. He’s even seen Finn do it a time or two, and even though Kurt hasn’t had much use for a razor himself yet, the sight of another man grooming has never given him pause before. But there’s something about the look on Puck’s face, all intensity and focus; there’s something about the line of his neck as he tilts his head to reach the back of his scalp, about the steady hum of the razor as it slides across his skin.

Kurt swallows against a sudden fluttering in his stomach, and when Puck looks up and meets his gaze in the mirror, Kurt feels himself blush.

“You want something?” Puck asks, one eyebrow raised in an expression that Kurt’s seen often enough, but never directed at him.

Instead of answering Kurt rolls his eyes and takes an awkward step across the threshold, leaning forward to reach in front of Puck for his toothbrush. He manages to close his hand around it without touching any part of Puck, but he can feel the heat rolling off Puck’s skin, and he doesn’t look in the mirror to see how red his own skin is.

“I’ll just use my father’s bathroom,” Kurt mumbles, and when he steals another glance at Puck, Kurt finds him smirking.

“Plenty of room in here for two,” Puck calls after him, but Kurt just blushes some more and heads for the stairs.

After that he starts to notice when Puck’s around. Which is pretty much all the time, especially now that school’s out for the summer. Puck’s just...always there, whether he’s sprawled on Finn’s bed, cheerfully insulting Finn’s manhood while they play video games, or stumbling into the kitchen long after dinner and interrupting Kurt’s nightly warm milk ritual to root around in a fridge that doesn’t even belong to him.

Granted, it technically doesn’t belong to Kurt either, but at least he _lives_ here.

But the worst of it is when Kurt wakes up in the morning and puts on his housecoat, then heads for the bathroom to brush his teeth and wash his face only to find the sink already occupied by one Noah Puckerman and his -- apparently daily -- shaving ritual.

The second time Kurt finds him there he’s shaving his face, the razor sliding over his neck and along the sharp angle of his jaw. Kurt watches its progress for a few beats, but when he realizes what he’s doing he blushes and shakes himself and starts to turn away.

Any hope that Puck might not have noticed his presence is dashed when Puck lets out a laugh and pauses in his routine long enough to look away from the mirror and right at Kurt. “What’s the problem? You never seen a dude shave before?”

Kurt flushes an even brighter shade of red for no good reason, but he shrugs and crosses his arms over his chest and stands his ground, just so Puck will know that Kurt’s not afraid of him or anything.

“Honestly, I’m just wondering why you’re here. Don’t you have a home to go to?”

For a few moments Puck just looks at him, then he shrugs and turns back to the mirror and resumes shaving his chin. “Finn’s my boy. Besides, there’s nothing else going on in this sorry town.”

It’s not really an explanation, but Kurt doesn’t press the issue. He’s not really all that interested in _why_ Finn and Puck are spending so much time together these days; he knows they’re not secretly dating, at any rate, and that’s the only interesting reason he could come up with for the amount of time Puck spends at their house.

At least he’s fairly sure that’s the case, but as soon as the idea occurs to him, he can’t stop thinking about it. And now he’s even more confused, because until recently he was under the impression that Puck was still dating Lauren Zizes.

A phone call to Mercedes is all it takes to disabuse him of that notion; all he has to do is say Lauren’s name and Mercedes is spilling everything she knows, from Lauren’s declaration that Puck’s ‘just not doing it for her’ to the way Puck moped around school for the last month of their junior year. And Kurt was there for most of that time, but the truth is he never paid enough attention to Puck to notice that he was nursing a broken heart.

He’s paying attention now, fabricating excuses to wander past Finn’s room and glancing in the always open doorway on the off chance that he’ll catch Finn and Puck doing something Kurt never would have believed of either of them. But when they’re in there it’s always to play loud, violent video games, and neither of them seems to notice Kurt lurking around. The rest of the time they’re usually parked in front of the TV in the living room, watching the Reds play or watching “MTV Cribs” and comparing notes on what their own rock star pads would look like.

As though either of them is ever going make it big in the music industry. Kurt doesn’t point it out, though, because he knows what it’s like to dream about bigger things than Lima has to offer, and he doesn’t dislike either of them enough to crush whatever feeble fantasies their limited imaginations can come up with.

He doesn’t dislike Finn at all; they’ve been getting along pretty well since their parents got married, and as much as Kurt would like to deny it, it’s kind of nice, having a...well, something like a brother. Even Puck isn’t completely awful, at least not when he’s away from the rest of the Neanderthals at McKinley. He’s large and distracting and usually hogging the bathroom when Kurt wants it, but other than that, he’s mostly...okay.

He doesn’t take advantage of his constant access to Kurt’s person to torture him, at any rate. Mostly he just acts like Kurt isn’t there, and when they are forced to acknowledge one another, Puck’s managed to be at least polite, if not actually pleasant. Which may be the most unsettling part of Puck’s sudden presence in Kurt’s life.

The third time Kurt finds Puck shaving in his bathroom, Puck doesn’t even look up at him. He just moves over, and to Kurt’s credit he only hesitates for a beat or two before he takes the unspoken invitation. He reaches around Puck for his toothbrush and tries his hardest to pretend that he’s not watching Puck shave his head while he brushes his teeth.

The sound of the electric razor is sort of soothing, though, and after a few moments it’s easy to forget why he was trying so hard not to look at Puck in the first place. If Puck notices him looking he doesn’t seem to mind, which is no surprise, considering how much Puck’s always enjoyed attention. But as far as Kurt knows he’s never invited attention from another boy before, so there’s a part of Kurt that expects Puck to catch him looking and ask what the hell he thinks he’s doing.

Puck does notice him looking eventually, but when he does he just smirks at Kurt in the mirror and angles his neck to the other side to start on the other half of his head. And it’s just Puck, so Kurt shouldn’t feel weird about leaning over the sink to spit toothpaste into the basin. He shouldn’t be self-conscious about rinsing his mouth or washing his face and patting it dry, because it’s just his _face_ , and anyway Puck doesn’t care what he does.

Except that he can feel the weight of Puck’s gaze on him, absently running the razor over his scalp with the ease of long practice while he watches Kurt go through his morning routine. It’s strange and bizarrely intimate, and Kurt’s kissed Blaine plenty of times, but he’s never felt this scrutinized before. As though Puck’s _looking_ in a way no one ever has, even his own sort-of-boyfriend.

Then again, maybe that’s the reason Blaine’s only sort of his boyfriend; he and Blaine spend time together, they hold hands and they talk about fashion and music and argue about whether or not Kurt’s decision to go back to McKinley was the right one. But Blaine doesn’t really _look_ at him, at least not until Kurt’s own attention starts to wander.

Kurt sighs and pushes the thought as far back in his mind as it will go, but Puck’s still looking, and when Kurt glances up he’s not that surprised to find Puck frowning at him in the mirror.

“What’s the matter with you?” Puck asks, voice gruff, and there was a time when Kurt would have bristled and told him to mind his own business.

But he’s been watching Puck for a little while now, and he’s starting to think that Puck actually cares about the answer. At the very least he’s noticed that something’s wrong, and that’s more than Kurt would have expected of him.

“It’s not important,” Kurt answers, mostly because he’s fairly sure Puck doesn’t want to hear about his relationship problems, even if they weren’t too pathetic to voice aloud.

Puck shrugs and turns back to the mirror, the long line of his neck bared toward Kurt again, and for the first time he allows himself to lean against the counter and enjoy the view. When Puck looks over at him again Kurt just shrugs back, and when Puck laughs Kurt’s mouth curves into a small smile.

“What does it feel like?” he asks before he even realizes he’s thinking it.

“What, you mean you’ve never shaved before?” Puck asks, both eyebrows raised this time and Kurt feels his face heat up.

“I was blessed with naturally smooth skin. It’s perfectly normal. Unusual, but it’s not a byproduct of my homosexuality or anything.”

Kurt hears the words tumbling out of his mouth and wishes he could stop them, mostly because Puck’s looking at him like he’s some kind of alien life form. And it’s all true; he’s done enough research to know that his baby face and smooth skin is just one of those quirks of genetics, but when he’s standing next to Puck in the bathroom mirror, it’s hard not to feel a little...well, _less than_.

When he finally stops talking his whole face feels hot, and he knows his naturally smooth skin is bright red. But he doesn’t look away, so he sees the moment when Puck reaches out with his free hand, and for a second Kurt expects a hard shove out of the bathroom. Instead Puck’s hand lands on his cheek, fingers sliding across his skin for a breath, then another before they’re gone again.

“Damn,” Puck murmurs, and Kurt’s almost sure he doesn’t even realize he’s said it. Then he shakes his head and looks away, unplugging his razor and stowing it in its case before he looks at Kurt again. “You’re still hooking up with that dude from your gay school, right? Doesn’t he ever shave in front of you?”

Kurt tries to imagine Blaine shaving; he realizes Blaine does, because he’s felt the scratch of mid-afternoon stubble across his cheek when they’ve kissed. But somehow whenever he pictures Blaine he always sees him in his Dalton-issue blazer, even though they’ve spent enough time together for Kurt to be fairly well acquainted with Blaine’s personal style.

He’s more fashion-forward than Puck, in a Midwestern, ‘I shop at the Gap and not just because of the cute guys’ way, but somehow in Kurt’s imagination, Puck manages to look better in -- and out -- of clothes than Blaine. Not that he’s spent much time trying to picture either of them without their clothes, mostly because whenever he does he just ends up blushing so hard he can’t focus on anything else. But he’s seen Puck shirtless enough times to know he can back up every claim he makes about his legendary guns, and when it comes to Blaine, the blazer always gets in the way.

“Blaine and I don’t really have that kind of relationship,” Kurt finally answers, and he’s still blushing, but it’s true, so he doesn’t try to qualify it with a rambling explanation. Mostly their relationship hasn’t changed all that much, except for the part where they kiss now, and Kurt doesn’t really have a leg to stand on with his dad when it comes to letting Blaine spend the night in his room.

Puck’s only response is a noncommittal noise, but it’s not the preverbal grunt that Kurt’s always attributed to Puck and the rest of the jock squad in his imagination. This is more a little hum, of disbelief, maybe, or possibly just deep thought. It’s certainly not displeasure, no matter what it sounds like, because Puck doesn’t care what Kurt and Blaine do together.

Kurt frowns and waits for Puck to leave the bathroom before he shuts the door, then he stares at his reflection in the mirror and presses his fingers to the spot where he can still feel Puck’s touch.

He doesn’t see Puck again for two days, not that he’s counting. It’s a Thursday when Puck reaches out and touches Kurt’s cheek, and he spends the rest of the day distracted and blushing every time he remembers the look on Puck’s face when he murmured a soft _damn_ under his breath. If Rachel and Mercedes notice the way he keeps touching his cheek they don’t bring it up, but he knows he’s not exactly holding up his end of the conversation.

The next day he stays home, mostly wandering around the house hoping for a sign of Puck or even Finn, seeing as they’re attached at the hip these days. And he still hasn’t figured out what’s going on with them, exactly, but when he doesn’t see them all day on Friday he tells himself it doesn’t matter.

It doesn’t, because Puck’s not suddenly interested in _Kurt_ just because Lauren rejected him, and even if he was, Kurt has a boyfriend. But thinking about Blaine just makes him feel guilty for no reason at all, because it’s not cheating if another boy touches his cheek, especially if that boy is one hundred percent heterosexual.

So Puck’s a little less awful than he used to be. It’s not like it _means_ anything.

After wasting his entire Friday he’s determined not to have a repeat performance on Saturday, so Kurt forces himself to make plans with Blaine which consist of the usual: coffee, then the mall, then more coffee while they flip through the magazines they bought at the mall, then back to Kurt’s house to listen to music and argue about whether or not Kurt’s going to regret transferring back to public school for his senior year.

He’s sitting on his bed flipping through a magazine, only half-listening to Blaine when a throat clears in the hallway outside his room, and Kurt looks up in time to watch Finn and Puck walk by. When they reach his door Puck pauses, holding Kurt’s gaze for a beat before he glances over at Blaine. And Kurt knows better than to believe Puck’s actually _jealous_ , so the look on his face must mean something else. It has to; either that or Kurt’s taken a terrible fall and he’s lying unconscious somewhere, hallucinating a world in which Puck could ever be attracted to him.

Kurt hears Blaine say hi and pictures his friendly smile without even looking. He _thinks_ about looking, because it’s a nice smile, but for some reason he’s having trouble looking away from Puck’s face. He sees the shadow of a beard starting to show along Puck’s jaw and wonders how it would feel under his fingers, wonders if Puck’s scalp feels as rough as his chin probably does.

“Hey,” Puck answers, but he’s looking at Kurt again. Kurt opens his mouth to say _something_ , though he has no idea what. Before he figures it out Puck’s gone again, leaving Kurt staring at his empty doorway and wondering what, exactly, just happened.

It takes a little while to remember that Blaine’s still sitting in his desk chair, but when he does Kurt turns to find Blaine watching him with a curious expression. “Everything okay?”

“Of course, why wouldn’t it be?” Kurt asks, but he can feel the heat creeping up his cheeks and he’s fairly sure even Blaine won’t miss that.

“Because a member of your own Glee club just stopped by to say hi and you just stared at him like you thought he might be thinking about killing you. If you can’t even be comfortable around the football players in your own Glee club, how are you going to handle being back at public school? See, this is exactly the reason you should have stayed at Dalton.”

That’s all it takes for Blaine to launch right back into the lecture he’d been working up to before Puck appeared in his doorway. Kurt tunes out the words he’s already heard a dozen times, but he lets Blaine keep talking, mostly because he’s not sure how to explain that it’s not that he’s afraid of what Puck might do to him, but of what he’d be willing to let Puck do.

The next time Kurt sees Puck is hours after Blaine goes home. He’s in the kitchen, heating up milk -- for himself, since he got the hint months ago that Finn didn’t appreciate the gesture -- when Puck walks in. He’s wearing a pair of sweats and a black tank top, stretched tight over a broad chest and when Kurt catches himself staring he swallows and turns back to the stove.

“Hey,” Puck says on his way to the fridge. He pulls out the milk and pours himself a glass, and when Kurt ventures a glance over at him he raises an eyebrow.

“It’s better warm.”

For a second Puck frowns at him, then he shrugs and holds out the glass. Kurt takes it, careful not to touch Puck’s fingers as he pulls it free and adds it to the pan of milk already warming on the stove. He pulls another mug out of the cabinet and sets it on the counter next to his own, then he turns back to the milk and pretends not to notice Puck watching him while he waits for it to reach the perfect temperature.

A few moments pass by in silence, though it feels like an eternity to Kurt, because Puck’s just standing there the whole time, breathing and watching him and being _Puck_. And Kurt’s never known him to be particularly thoughtful, but he seems to spend a lot of his time lately thinking, and Kurt’s not sure if it’s more of that personal growth or if he just can’t think of anything to say to Kurt.

“So what kind of relationship do you have?”

Kurt looks up at the sound of Puck’s voice, eyes wide for a second before he catches himself and pulls it together. “Excuse me?”

“You and your boy,” Puck elaborates, nodding in the direction of the stairs, as though Blaine’s still up there somewhere, waiting for Kurt to bring him a mug of warm milk.

Just one more thing about him Blaine thinks is sort of lame, Kurt reminds himself, frowning down at the pan for a second before he reaches out to turn the heat off.

“To be honest, I’m not really sure. For awhile he made it clear that he wasn’t interested, then one day, suddenly he was. Or so he said, but he hasn’t exactly done anything about it.”

For a long time Kurt was fine with that. For a while it seemed like the perfect relationship, because there was no pressure to go further than he was ready to go, and whenever he started to wonder if there _should_ be more, Blaine always managed to say the right thing to draw him back in. But lately...lately he’s found himself reacting to Puck in ways that he’s never reacted to Blaine, and that’s the kind of dangerous territory he’s always tried to avoid.

When Kurt ventures a glance at Puck he’s nodding like he knows exactly what Kurt means, but that’s impossible. Puck’s sex incarnate, after all, and Kurt can’t imagine anyone ever telling him he’s not their definition of attractive.

“That’s kind of the way things went down between me and Lauren,” Puck says, and when Kurt holds out a mug of warm milk for him to take, Puck’s fingers curl around his. Just for a second, then Kurt’s sliding his hand out from under Puck’s, and Puck lets him. But his fingers feel warm and he knows it’s not just because of the warmth of the mug.

“I find that extraordinarily difficult to believe.”

“I know, right?” Puck says, and Kurt can’t help smiling at his incredulous expression. “At first she was totally into me, but then we actually made out, and it was pretty much downhill from there. I tried, believe me. I mean, she’s even more badass than I am, right? Who wouldn’t want to get with somebody like that? But the longer we waited, the less into me she was. Sometimes I think she strung me along all that time just because she wanted to see how far I’d go.”

It’s strange to think that he and Puck might actually have something in common, especially when it comes to dating. But Puck’s more or less describing Kurt’s entire relationship with Blaine, and the longer he thinks about it, the more depressing it sounds.

“Anyway, I figured it was time to cut her loose, you know?” Puck adds, and Kurt knows it’s a lie, but he doesn’t call Puck on it. If he wants to save face, Kurt can’t really blame him. He’s the one still dating Blaine when it’s clear Blaine likes the _idea_ of a boyfriend a lot more than he likes Kurt, after all.

Puck shrugs and takes a sip of warm milk, then he looks up at Kurt. “This is kind of gross.”

“It’s an acquired taste,” Kurt says, and when Puck shrugs again and takes another sip Kurt has to work hard to stifle a smile. “So if you’re done insulting my hospitality, can I ask you a question?”

“Shoot,” Puck answers, then he takes another, longer sip of milk.

“What exactly is going on between you and Finn?”

Puck rolls his eyes at the question, and for a second Kurt thinks he’s going to refuse to answer. “I told you, Finn’s my boy. He’s trying to make a clean break with Quinn and Rachel, and I’m just being a good wingman and making sure he doesn’t cave and call either of them. I figure it’s the least I can do, considering.”

Considering what, he doesn’t say, likely because he assumes Kurt already knows. They all do; they were there, after all, for the drama and then for the aftermath.

“So you two aren’t...”

Puck lets out a soft laugh and looks at Kurt over the rim of his mug. “Hell, no. Finnessa may be a total chick, but he’d never go for that.”

He pushes himself off the counter as soon as he’s done talking, then he sets his mug in the sink and looks at Kurt again. “Speaking of which, I better get up there before he figures out where I hid his phone and tries to sext Rachel or something. Thanks for the milk.”

He’s gone before Kurt can work up the courage to ask if _Puck_ would go for it, and if so, whether or not he’d choose Finn. And it’s just as well, because Kurt’s almost sure they could stand in his kitchen for the rest of their lives and he’d never find the courage to ask that question.

Kurt loiters in the kitchen a little longer, but finally he has to face the reality that Puck’s not going to come back. He tells himself he’s not disappointed; he’s not, because in order to be disappointed, he’d have to be expecting something from Puck. And he’s definitely not expecting anything, because they’re not even friends, so there’s no reason to think they’re going to be anything more.

He washes and dries the mugs, then he puts them away before he climbs the stairs to his room. He changes into a clean pair of pajamas before he heads for the bathroom to brush and floss, and he’s not disappointed to find it empty. Puck’s hardly going to be shaving at 11:00 at night, after all; he’s probably already passed out in Finn’s room, or they’re in having an all-night video game tournament.

Kurt considers knocking on the door and inviting himself to join them; he knows he’s too restless to sleep, and it’s not like Finn’s going to think anything of Kurt wanting to hang out and watch him and Puck blow things up. But Puck might, and Kurt’s not sure if he wants Puck to know how he feels or not. Then again, in order for Puck to know how he feels, Kurt would have to know, and the truth is he doesn’t have a clue.

He scowls at his reflection in the bathroom mirror before he pulls the door open again, intent on going back to his own room for his moisturizing routine and a long, sleepless night. But when he pulls open the bathroom door Puck’s standing there, one arm braced on the doorframe and his other hand rubbing absently at the stubble on his chin.

“Took you long enough,” he says, and when Kurt arches an eyebrow Puck smirks at him. He opens his mouth to remind Puck that it’s his bathroom, and if Puck doesn’t like the accommodations, he’s got his own room in his own house...somewhere in town.

Before he gets the words out Puck’s moving forward, backing him into the room and kicking the door shut behind him. For a second Kurt really is just as scared as Blaine accused him of being earlier, but then Puck reaches out and touches his cheek again, the same way he did just a few days ago, and the fear fluttering in Kurt’s stomach shifts to something else. Something warm and tight, curling in the base of his stomach and making him reach out to close his hands around the front of Puck’s shirt.

His back’s pressed against the sink and Puck’s hands are on his hips, holding him in place as though maybe he thinks Kurt’s going to try to get away. For a second Kurt considers it, just to see if Puck would let him. Then Puck leans in and brushes his lips against Kurt’s, soft and tentative and almost sweet, and Kurt stops thinking about everything except kissing Puck again.

As soon as Puck starts to pull away Kurt’s arms slide around his neck, holding him close and tugging him forward for another kiss. Harder this time, sure and intense and Kurt feels it all the way to his toes. Puck’s stubble is scratchy against his cheek, but when Kurt slides a hand up Puck’s neck and over his scalp, his skin’s soft. Puck lets out a noise that sounds suspiciously like a purr and pushes back into Kurt’s hand, and Kurt doesn’t try to hold back a laugh.

“Took you long enough,” Kurt whispers, and Puck grins at him up close and then leans in to kiss him again.


End file.
